


It's My Party ( And I'll Cry if I want To )

by akingman



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: I had some feelings, M/M, Projection, Terribly OOC, self indulgent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 06:40:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21351892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akingman/pseuds/akingman
Summary: It's Cass's birthday and Andrew has a few feelings about it.
Relationships: Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Comments: 2
Kudos: 50





	It's My Party ( And I'll Cry if I want To )

**Author's Note:**

> Hi. Hello. This is a deeply personal, had to get it off my chest, drabble. It's my mother's birthday today and I'm incredibly bittersweet about it. I at first wanted to write something for my fic series Fix Me about Betsy and Andrew's sessions but... nah. 
> 
> Anyhow, this is super self-indulgent and not really made for any reason except that writing is my therapy right now and it's been a rough day. I can't really say 'enjoy!' because there's a lot to feel about Andrew and his relationship with Cass. I would have touched upon more, and there are things now after I'm done that i'd like to add but it... it's getting late and this is enough for me!
> 
> Thank you for reading any of my works, leaving kudos, leaving comments, etc. It means everything to me. 
> 
> Thank you~

He could hear and feel everything. He could see her smile. He remembered the happiness he felt when he heard her voice and how it felt like she was singing to him and only him. He wanted to sing like her too. To look into her eyes and see them sparkle and know that it was only for him. All he ever wanted was to feel like her son again. 

There were always the good and bad times. His eidetic memory made it so that he couldn't forget any detail. Including the things that shouldn’t of mattered. The good times were good enough to survive until the next day, days that made him put down the knife. And there were the others that pressed the knife into already red skin. Good times were going to school and making one friend who stuck by his side ( until they didn’t ). Good times were birthday cakes with candles. And ice cream to indulge himself with sweetness to mask the pain. Good times were listening to his mother sing to him and the world around them. Good times were the moments where said times were enough. 

Bad times were the worst times. It was staying up even on a school night with the covers of his bed tucked over his face. A small hole he could breathe through so he wouldn’t suffocate. It was never sleeping at all because his bedroom door never stayed closed. He could never scream. Bad times included hearing his mother laugh, cry or sing and wanting instead to curl up and scream. Until the voices and the bottled up nausea went away. It was standing in the shower and staring at a white wall and not feeling anything. Bad times meant he spent more time cutting his wrists than he did dreaming about the future and what it could be. It meant holding onto his mother while digging a hole, rather than crawling out and being more okay alone. 

Andrew understood these things. He understood that leaving the fake family behind meant living another day. Recognizing that he didn’t need it. He understood that most people could have what he wanted and he was one of the few who could not. Loving someone and hurting. It was a choice he made as a child. He was dependent and alone and he clawed at every moment to hold onto some sort of real love and affection. Only, there came a time where the pain was too much. He wanted to live and if he had to lose the one good thing in his life, so be it. 

He was sitting across from Bee now and wondering how he got into this particular session. Andrew couldn’t think of a single word to say to her. It was hard for him to get up in the morning and another to walk past families and kids on the way to the center. Seeing happy smiles and relationships walk past stuck a wedge in his chest and twisted. 

Today was his mother’s birthday. Or well, his old mother's birthday. Cass Speare's birthday. Speare was a name engraved on his skin in fingerprints and aches that existed long before. And he missed her. He missed her so, so, so much. So much it hurt. So much so that he recalled the music she liked and listened to it while he showered and hung his head under the water. He recalled the way she attempted to learn the lyrics of the songs he played on CD’s her husband burned for him. He recalled the way that she tried to remember all his favorite foods. Only that she couldn’t remember that he preferred white chocolate over dark. He liked thinking about the way she tried to insert herself in his few interests. Like when they went to museums and watched survival shows on TV. When his foster brother and foster father were away he recalled so much of her as he could.

His mind started to sort through all these good memories and the bad ones began sinking in. Other mothers were bad. Cass? She was good, so good that he could not fault her for being complacent. In time he understood how innocent she was to the world, and it brought him comfort. To know he had shielded her from the truth. If anything, he wanted to keep her and hiding behind a false bravado allowed him to have a mother. Now she knew and she hated him. He wasn't surprised.

Andrew loved Cass’s birthdays. The entire family celebrated together by going to a steak house. Where they dined lavishly on well done meat and potatoes. Andrew couldn’t not be happy when Cass threw peanuts at him over the table, even though…. Even though his foster brother's hand was squeezing his right leg. And his foster father was staring at him from across the table. He smiled because he knew day by day he was growing closer to not having anything at all. To the day where he decided he didn’t want to do it anymore.

He recalled the waiters dancing in a line with hands crossed around their backs. The way they sang loud even though their bright pink cheeks said they would rather not be dancing in a crowd. He wasn’t much of a fan of country or the steak house and often meat tasted sour, and yet he did it for Cass. For his one and only mother. He enjoyed seeing the youth on her face even as she blue out thirty eight candles. He remembered looking into her eyes over the table and smiling back at her and how her shoulders relaxed. She put her hand over the table and he put his hand in hers and they held hands until the dinner and party was over. That night he had slept better than any other night, or any other year, and his door remained closed. 

  
“She was a good woman.” Betsy said over the cup she was holding to her mouth. 

  
Her hair was bob short to the bottom of her ears and her glasses pushed up by a delicate index finger. Her nails colored blue this week, because Andrew said he liked blue and Betsy wanted to try it out herself. It wasn’t the first blue she’d applied and it was the one Andrew bought her because he’d told her it was the color he preferred. She wasn’t going to point out that it was equal to the color of Neil’s eyes and Andrew pretended she didn’t know.

  
Andrew took a sip from his cup but only to keep in motion. Sitting in his thoughts left him stiff and he had to set the cup down on the table in front of him and stretch out his legs. He stared down at his shoes and tried to sort through everything. It was all coming up like bile. These were the things he buried over years and years of struggle and hard work. The things he only shared with himself and kept locked like a secret. These were the things he could only share with Betsy Dobson. 

“Selfless. Kind. Beautiful,” Andrew replied through dry lips. He raised his chin and swept a look over Bee’s shoulder, out the window on the back wall where birds flew and trees swayed. 

“She loved you,” Betsy observed. 

  
“And I her.” Andrew said. He felt numb. Awfully cold. 

  
His heart and chest hurt and it was hard to breath. He heard Bee’s long fingernails tap against the porcelain cup in no particular tune. He came back to the warm room in fragments. He felt a shiver run from the static in his arms and up to the tip of his shoulders. He first focused on his breathing like she’d told him to and then on his vision. He stared into Bee’s patient face. He used two fingers on each hand to brush against the sofa to remind him of where he was. Bee’s office. Safe. 

  
“Don’t think of the others, Andrew.” Betsy said. 

  
“I’m trying,” Andrew thought he said. He whispered the words like saying them quiet enough that she wouldn't hear. “I’m-” He licked his chapped lips and felt his tongue collapse in on itself when he couldn’t force anything out. 

  
“It's Thursday,” Bee reminded him. “It’s November 7th and you’re in my office.”

  
Andrew attempted a nod and found his vision fading in and out. He tried to focus but it was hard. It was all hard. Waking up. Pretending. Being happy. Smiling. Going to school. Working. Being a song. Being someone-

  
“Andrew.” Betsy said to bring him back. “It’s okay, come back to me.”

  
He tried. He tried. He tried to be a good son. He tried to be a good boy. He tried not to be a burden. He tried not to call out of work most when he wanted to curl up and cry. He tried to get good grades even when his emotions overrode the filing cabinet in his head. A brain stored with information that didn’t or wouldn’t make a difference if he was dead the next day, or week, or month. It was only a matter of time he said every night. Before he got into a clean pair of underwear and pajamas, even though he still felt dirty. He tried not to ask for too much, eat too much or want too much. He tried to stay out of everyone’s way but fit in at the same time. He had tried so hard and yet he couldn’t keep her. He made the decision to lose her and now what does he have?

  
“Family,” Betsy said as if she could read his thoughts. “Can get lost and found. She will not be your only family. She made the decision to grieve someone who hurt you and you aren't the one who has to live with that decision. It's your choice and you are doing better without her. You have a support system of people who love-”

  
Andrew scoffed at her. Betsy was not deterred and carried on. 

  
“Who love you. Who appreciate everything you do and who you are. Regardless of how you feel about yourself, about how your past has made you feel. It is okay to rely on them to fulfill the needs we all have. You are not alone anymore. Andrew, you there?”

  
“Yes.”

  
“Good. Now, you should take the day to think about this day any way you wish. Remember the good things and leave out the bad. This is about you and Cass, no one else.. It will all be with you no matter what, and it’s something you can have if you want it. Take the day to focus on the family you have today. Be with them, around them, but don’t isolate.”

  
Andrew fiddled with his fingers in his lap and nodded along to what she was saying. The words swept over him like information stored for later but he heard her nonetheless. He glanced up at the clock when he realized she was wrapping the session up. Had it been that long already? Also, had his pocket vibrated or was it his imagination. He went to check only he got distracted by Betsy standing up. 

  
“You’ve made quite the progress today, Andrew.”  
“I didn’t talk much.”  
“Sometimes you don’t need words at all.”  
“Poetic.”

  
Andrew finally fished his phone from his pocket. Betsy collected their cups and placed them onto her office desk a few inches away. He pressed his code in and found a couple messages waiting for him, but he focused on Neil’s first. 

  
**FROM NEIL**: Outside. Cigarette started. Cake if you want it.’  
**TO NEIL**: K. K.

  
He stalled a moment and then looked up as Betsy met his eyes. He looked back at his phone and caught his bottom lip between his teeth before typing at the screen.

  
**TO NEIL**: Yes  
**FROM NEIL**; :) 

  
He waved to Betsy as he got up. He gave her the most casual ‘see ya’ he could conjure and high tailed it out of the room. He walked outside and found the black beast waiting for him. Neil was ass against the hood with a cigarette wedged between two fingers. He had another between his lips as he coaxed red out of the tip. Neil was sitting next to a white shopping bag.

  
He took the cigarette Neil had started for him and inhaled as much as he could. He exhaled and turned his head to see Neil was staring and flicked his gaze away. They were more comfortable with each other now. But even Andrew’s intrusive thoughts came by now and then to tell him he couldn’t have this. That it wasn’t real, and one day he would wake up and it would all be a sick joke on his part. And like most of his nightmares, Drake would pop out behind a realistic prop and shout ‘Gotcha!’.

He pushed back these nasty thoughts with the burn of the cigarette. He sat next to Neil against the car and laid out his hand, palm up and open for Neil to grab if he wanted. He’d brought it up to Neil after Betsy goals; such as reaching out for each other. Instead of in and choosing each other than suffering alone. Neil took his hand and it brought Andrew back to the present. He felt his anxiety dissipate and a calm wave roll over him. He sucked in a breath of fresh air and stubbed out the rest of the cigarette.

  
Neil knew what this day was and how much it meant to him. Neil crushed the cigarette he had under his foot and handed Andrew the bag. Inside was a plastic wrapped plastic container with a small sized cake. The frosting was chocolate, like he liked, and Neil told him it was marble, like he liked. He squeezed Neil’s hand to thank him. Neil understood and squeezed back. Andrew toyed with the idea of throwing the cake on the grand but didn't in the end. Some habits he could control if he wanted. But. He took off the cover and enjoyed the cracking of plastic as it ripped off. He felt proud of the sound rather than scared. Instead of a slash against the wrist he got Neil’s approving look from the corner of his eye. 

Andrew pulled back his hand and Neil let him. He watched as he used the plastic black knife in the bag to cut off a decent size part of cake. He marveled at how well Neil could make some bad things go away, and replace them with good. It didn’t feel possible, but here he was, breaking down his fence and shitting all over his field like a fucking cow. His favorite cow, if Andrew thought much of it. He wouldn’t tell Neil that because he would find it funny. And because it was an Andrew thing, but he didn’t want to give him the chance to be arrogant. 

“Thank you,” Andrew said, because he was learning manners. It could go unsaid that he was more than thankful. He felt many more things rising from the pit of his stomach, that were good. And pushed it all down with a kiss to Neil’s hungry lips. Neil kissed back and Andrew fought to keep in control so he could pull away and get started on the cake. 

He divided a piece and transferred it onto the plastic cover and handed it over to Neil. When Neil gave him a questioning look, Andrew managed a smile and held the remaining whole of the cake to his chest. 

  
“That’s yours,” he said and gestured at his chest with a free hand. “This is mine.”

  
“Only if you eat it all,” Neil said with a smile back, but they both knew they’d end up sharing to the very last crumble. 

  
Andrew would be content all day, to be in Neil’s presence and everything else. 

  
“The rest?” He asked meaning the fox team.   
“I told them to go out for a while. We can go back and watch some movies, if you’d like.”  
“Only if I can pick them.”  
“I wouldn't have it either way.”

  
Neil brushed his shoulder and then they ate in silence. 


End file.
